


you make my heart beat like the rain

by starkmccall



Category: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: F/M, Pining, Sharing a Bed, heavyhanded shakespeare foreshadowing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-14
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-11-30 04:01:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11455548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starkmccall/pseuds/starkmccall
Summary: '“Nice.” She bumps their shoulders together and then holds hers there, keeping a point of contact between them. “Same.” Peter looks up from his hands to her face, and she’s wearing an expression he’s never seen before. It’s kind, and open, and wildly beautiful in a way he’s never really noticed before, and oh God, his brain’s going to start composing some shitty poetry if he doesn’t look away in the next two seconds. It’s not that he’s never noticed Michelle is pretty, it’s kind of impossible not to, but it was always in an objective, factual way: the sky is blue, grass is green, Michelle is beautiful. And besides, he spent too much time pining over Liz to even think of anyone else. But now Liz is in Oregon, and Michelle is here, touching their shoulders together, and he’s probably going to tell her that he’s Spiderman.'(Post Homecoming. Peter develops feelings for Michelle, and mostly deals with it well.)





	you make my heart beat like the rain

**Author's Note:**

> this fic is alternately titled 'they looked at each other like twice and i decided they were in love' and alternately alternately titled 'local girl writes 15k fic for pairing which has like five readers'
> 
> the real title is from electric love by børns which i've listened to on repeat like 100 times in the last five days because it is exactly the type of song which should play while peter and michelle have a cheesy romantic moment in the sequel if there's any marvel producers out there reading this
> 
> warning for a mildly graphic description of a panic attack and mentions of kidnapping and sexual harassment
> 
> also not a warning but peter and michelle are both bi in this so if you're a raging homophobe this isn't the fic for you and also get fucked lol

It starts, as all classic romance stories do, with some light street harassment.

Peter’s walking down Austin Ave, clutching a paper bag from Martha’s Country Bakery in his hand. May’s been a little stressed recently, what with the revelation that her beloved nephew is also a masked vigilante who has near constant run-ins with death, so he figures the least he can do is buy her some pie. He’s got his head down and his headphones in, blasting the new Kendrick Lamar album which he’d downloaded after weeks of Ned telling him that “it’ll change your entire life dude, seriously.”, which means he doesn’t notice the two guys stopped on the footpath ahead of him, and almost walks straight into them. What he does notice when he looks up, however, is that they’ve got an angry looking Michelle Jones backed up against the wall.

Peter wants to be able to say that he instantly punched both of the guys in the face, knocking them unconscious. The reality is he just kind of stared at them until they took notice and told him to “fuck off, asshole.” Peter’s brain is apparently actively rooting for him to get murdered, because all that comes out of his mouth is a stumbled “Why don’t you?”

“Peter,” Michelle’s expression is somewhere between amused and exasperated, “It’s fine. I’ve got this.”

“Yeah, _Peter,_ ” One of the guys echoes, putting emphasis on the ‘p’ so that a nice spray of saliva hits Peter’s face. “She doesn’t need your help. She wants to play with the big bo-what the FUCK.” He screams, holding both hands to his crotch, and Peter sees Michelle dart out from behind them and sprint down the street towards 71st. The guy she’s kneed in the balls has collapsed to the ground by this point, and his friend is staring at him in shock, giving Peter the opportunity to do the same to him and run in the same direction as Michelle. Traffic’s pretty light, as it’s 2:00pm on a Sunday, but a middle-aged woman sitting in her four-wheel drive is staring at him in alarm as he runs.

He finally catches up to Michelle at the intersection between 71st and Austin, though he’s breathing hard by the time he reaches her. Peter’s never seen her run before today, and it’s apparent that she can be pretty goddamn fast when she wants to be. To be fair, any person would probably be that fast if they had two relatively large, angry dudes potentially chasing after them. Her face is completely unreadable, though that’s common enough that he doesn’t really think anything of it.

“I’m not going to thank you, you know.” She says, lacking preamble as always. “You’re not a hero because you kicked some guy in the balls after I’d already ran away.”

“I didn’t-I wasn’t-”

“Good.” Michelle nods, smirking a little. “And don’t tell anyone about this, either. I mean, I know you and Ned like, share a consciousness or something, but this isn’t really a story I want circulating.”

Peter has finally regained his ability to form intelligent, full sentences, and manages to say “We do not share a consciousness!” in time for the lights to change and Michelle to begin crossing the road, the complete opposite way to where Peter is going.

“Keep telling yourself that!” She yells back, not even bothered to turn back to face him. He almost expects her to pull the finger, but she just walks off without a goodbye or a second glance. By her standards, it’s probably the friendliest she’s ever been to him.

Peter does manage to avoid mentioning the encounter to Ned, or May, and Michelle makes no reference to it the entire next week at school, so he figures it hasn’t bothered her at all. He does keep a look out for the two guys as he swings around the neighbourhood, worried that he’ll see them harassing someone, but he fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you want to look at the situation, hasn’t seen them since.

He’s mostly relegated himself to watching over people rather than actively searching for crime after May’s mild breakdown over his safety, but that doesn’t stop incidents from occurring. He has to wear makeup to school in order to cover a huge, ugly black eye that he got in stopping a mugging, and Michelle takes one look at his face before their early-morning Academic Decathlon practice and asks him, point blank, why he’s hiding a black eye.

“Are you part of a fight club?” She asks, tone so serious he would probably think she _was_ serious if he didn’t know her better. “Are you making your money as a low-rent criminal? Did you just accidentally punch yourself in the face?”

“I, uh, walked into a door” Wow, smooth Parker, that’ll definitely impress her. Not that he’s trying to impress her, obviously, but he figures trying not to make a complete fool of himself in front of literally every girl he knows is a good principle to live his life by. “Though, the first rule of Fight Club is not to talk about Fight Club, so I guess that could be a lie, and I could actually be a part of one.” Jesus Christ, why didn’t he just leave it at the door thing. Fortunately, Ned approaches them before he can damage the situation any further and starts up a conversation about the new Star Wars trailer, which leads to Ned and Michelle getting into a fairly heated debate over Rey parentage theories. Peter foolishly believes this means that Michelle has dropped it, or at least forgotten about it, but as they take their seats to begin practice she whispers, “You aren’t cool or douchey enough to attend a fight club, anyway.”

Peter tells Ned about this as they’re walking to calculus together, and Ned laughs loud enough to make a Freshman standing at her locker drop her bag, and cause all of her books to spin out across the floor. Peter bends down to help her, accidentally brushing her hand in the process and making her flush such an intense shade of red he’s almost worried for her health. This, of course, only makes Ned laugh harder, though only after she’s awkwardly run off.

“It’s really not that funny.” Peter glares, knocking their shoulders together a little. “But seriously, what am I going to do about Michelle?”

“You should tell her.”

“She would laugh straight in my face and then probably never talk to me again because she would think I’m insulting her intelligence or something.”

Ned considers this for a moment. “True, but you should still do it. It’s kind of stressful being the only one who knows your secret. Apart from May, of course, and Tony Stark, but I can’t exactly call him up for a chat about you and your superhero-Ow! Why’d you punch my arm?”

“We’re in school, dude!” Peter looks around anxiously, scanning the people around them to see if anyone seems to have overheard their conversation, because knowing Peter’s luck Michelle has probably been behind them all along and now knows everything, but fortunately she isn’t, and everyone around them seems to be completely oblivious to Ned’s comments. “The fact that I’m-you know-isn’t exactly an inconspicuous conversation topic.”

“You’re the one who brought it up in the first place!”

“Well, yeah but-whatever, okay. I’m not telling her, anyway, so it doesn’t matter. Now come on, we’re going to be late for calc.”

The next two periods manage to pass by fine and without incident, but because God apparently hates Peter and has a personal vendetta against his peace of mind, Michelle decides to sit directly across from him at lunch, rather than her customary five seats away. To her part, she doesn’t actually try anything, just picks at her sandwich and joins their discussion about the upcoming Calculus test. She doesn’t speak often, just interjects snarky comments at junctures in the conversation, or bickering with the both of them occasionally, and it almost feels-normal. As if they do this every day. Peter doesn’t think he would mind if it did.

“So, who do think Spiderman is?”

Peter takes it back. He minds. He definitely, definitely minds.

“How would we know?” He splutters immediately, which definitely helps him in trying to appear casual and as unsuspicious as possible.

“Haven’t you met him?” She replies, pinning him with a look.

“I mean, yeah, but he always wears the mask. Security reasons. He’s a private guy, you know, doesn’t talk much and also I don’t think Tony-Mr Stark-trusts me to keep my mouth shut, so-”

“Yeah, yeah,” Michelle says, waving a hand. “I mean, there are over 8 million people living in New York City,” She continues, as if Peter hasn’t even spoken. “So it’s unlikely to be someone we know. That would be pretty cool though. Unless it was Flash. Then I would have to take back every positive thing I ever said about Spiderman.”

Ned snorts, and holds his hand up for a fist bump, which she cautiously returns. Then, with a look at Peter that not even a blind person would describe as inconspicuous, says “So you’re a fan of Spiderman then?”

“He’s pretty cool.” Her tone is flippant, but her cheeks are a little red, which Peter is definitely not finding cute in anyway way. Obviously. “He seems to actually care about the little guys, which is nice. Plus, the cops kind of hate him, which gives him some credit.”

The conversation somehow moves on, but Peter isn’t a part of it. What if he did tell Michelle? Would that be weird? In theory, they’re friends, but not really in practice. They’ll sit together in class if there’s no-one else there that they know. Her number’s in his phone, though he’s never used it. She loves Reese’s Pieces with a passion unmatched to anything Peter’s ever seen, and would probably fistfight someone over their opinion on Game of Thrones. Okay, maybe they’re friends, but she isn’t Ned. She isn’t Liz. Which is maybe why he should tell her. She’s smart enough that she’ll probably somehow figure it out regardless, so really, he’s just speeding up the inevitable.

Last period sees him in English, listening to Michelle discuss at length about how shitty Claudio is to Hero with their teacher. “He publicly shames her at her wedding, just because he thought he saw her cheating on him. He doesn’t even let her defend herself, he just calls her a whore and leaves!”

“That’s a fair point.” Mr Park replies, and Michelle slumps back in her chair a little. Most teachers simply dismiss her rants, but Peter’s noticed that Mr Park seems to lead discussions that openly encourage them. “Miss Jones has pointed out an issue that plays into some of the key themes of Much Ado About Nothing: perception, communication, and deceit. Claudio has been deceived and believes what he saw is real, and so therefore his perception of Hero is heavily changed, as well as their relationship. If he’d bothered to communicate with her before the wedding, this likely never would have happened. This is also going to be a part of your homework, so I hope you were listening.” The entire class groans, and he smiles. “I know, I hate it too, but if I didn’t do it someone’s parents would probably think I don’t care about your education and petition to have me fired.

I want you to get into pairs, and I’m going to assign you a scene. You have to analyse that scene, and come up with ways that it relates to the themes and ideas of perception, communication and deceit. You have the entire weekend, and I don’t see you Monday, so I expect this to be done.”

Peter nudges Michelle’s knee with his own, which he then quickly realises is the most physical contact they’ve potentially ever had. “’Sup, partner.”

“Who says I want to be your partner?” She shoots back, but the glint in her eye makes it clear she’s joking.

“If you don’t want me you can go with Chad Wright. I know how much you adore straight white guys who spend all their time ranting about how taking away the right to bear arms would be the worst form of oppression that has ever faced the American people.” Michelle does a full body shudder at that, and Peter laughs.

“You say straight white guy as if you aren’t one.”

“I’m not.” He replies, without even thinking. Michelle cocks an eyebrow, but something in her expression softens. “I mean, uh, I’m definitely white. That’s indisputable. But straight-no. I, um, I swing both ways.” Jesus hell and Christ, he couldn’t just leave it at accidentally coming out to someone. He had to make a freaking web joke. The fact that the floor isn’t literally opening beneath his feet and dragging him down to hell is rude, frankly.

“Nice.” She bumps their shoulders together and then holds hers there, keeping a point of contact between them. “Same.” Peter looks up from his hands to her face, and she’s wearing an expression he’s never seen before. It’s kind, and open, and wildly beautiful in a way he’s never really noticed before, and oh God, his brain’s going to start composing some shitty poetry if he doesn’t look away in the next two seconds. It’s not that he’s never noticed Michelle is pretty, it’s kind of impossible not to, but it was always in an objective, factual way: the sky is blue, grass is green, Michelle is beautiful. And besides, he spent too much time pining over Liz to even think of anyone else. But now Liz is in Oregon, and Michelle is here, touching their shoulders together, and he’s probably going to tell her that he’s Spiderman.

It is, understandably, a lot for a teenage boy’s brain to process, and so he doesn’t even notice the teacher is calling his name until it’s happened three times and the entire class is laughing at him. “I’m glad to see that I have the ability to hold the attention of my students well.” Mr Park says, smiling to show he’s not angry. “You and Miss Jones have Act 2, Scene 1, if you can pay attention enough to analyse it.” Peter can feel his face burning as the bell rings, and hopes the redness will have faded enough that Ned won’t notice and question it when they meet up after school.

“We should meet up over the weekend, sort this out.” Michelle says as they’re putting their chairs up, as if nothing happened. “I can do all day tomorrow and Sunday morning, but not the afternoon.”

“Cool, cool cool cool cool cool.” Peter is being the complete opposite of that right now. “Um, yeah, I’m probably not busy at all, so Saturday will probably be good. Get it over with, you know. I’ll text you after I’ve talked to May.”

“May?” Michelle asks, eyebrow cocked again.

“My aunt. I live with her. She’s pretty cool, though she’ll probably force me to invite you to our house for dinner or something. I can lie for you, if you want, say you have 100 different allergies and have to live on a strict diet of organically sourced Guatemalan potatoes and Kobe beef, or something.”

Michelle snorts, a rare and undignified sound. “That probably won’t be necessary. Besides, why would I give up a perfect opportunity to hear all the stories of your embarrassing past?”

“You’re mean, you know that?”

She flashes him a grin, something again that is rare and definitely disarming. “And I’m about to have a lifetime of blackmail material. Maybe _you_ should have gone with Chad Wright”

“I would rather do a dramatic re-enactment of every humiliating. memory I have for you, but thanks for the suggestion.”

“I’m holding that to you.”

“I was hoping you wouldn’t say that.”

“And I was hoping,” Mr Park suddenly interjects. Peter had kind of forgotten he was a person who exists. “That my students would leave my classroom in peace at the end of the day, but if you want me to offer you some extra homework I can oblige.”

Peter’s face flames again, because of course it does, and Michelle simply apologises before tugging him by the wrist out the door. It’s only when they’re in the hallway and Michelle’s dropped his arm that Peter’s brain catches up to the fact that she just touched him, again, and their hands are now brushing against each other in a way that is making Peter’s heart beat in a way that definitely is not regular.  But also in a casual way, of course. It’s not like he has feelings for her. That’d be ridiculous.

“So, uh-“

“Yeah, I, um-”

“Peter!” Ned yells from down the hall, and both of their heads snap towards him. “Where have you been, dude, we’re gonna miss the train. There’s a copy of Borderlands 2 that’s calling our name.”

“Sounds like you’ve got a wild night ahead of you.” Michelle says, completely deadpan. “Try not to get too crazy. We still have that homework to do tomorrow.” With that, she walks off, Peter and Ned staring after her for way too long to be considered normal. She doesn’t look back.

“She’s officially our friend now, then?” Ned asks, eyes darting towards Peter.

“Yeah,” He replies, “She’s cool”

“Awesome. Now come on, Handsome Jack waits for no man.”

***

To Peter’s credit, he only checks his phone twice for a message from Michelle, but both of those times he’s distracted enough to leave Ned vulnerable to death, so of course he notices.

“If we die against Mad Mel again, I might actually die.” He says, flopping back against the back of Peter’s couch. “What on your phone could be more important than the road to New Haven? Are you talking to Liz?”

“What? No! I mean yeah, I talk to Liz, but not right at this very second and it’s not-it’s nothing like that anyway. She’s in Oregon. That’s pretty far away, in case you forgot.”

“Fine, it’s not Liz, but something is definitely up with you. You’ve been behaving weird all afternoon. Is something wrong? Do you know about some imminent alien attack? Are you moving to Oregon, too?”

Peter sighs. “No! Nothing is wrong, alright? I’m fine, everything’s-” He’s interrupted by his phone vibrating beside him, and it takes all of his willpower not to immediately snatch it up. “Everything’s fine, okay, it’s just normal stress. You don’t need to worry.”

Ned squints a little, but turns back to the screen as Peter picks up his phone. “Fine, but tell whoever that is to go away. There’s only so many times I can die against this guy before it gets seriously irritating.”

 **decathlon michelle:** hey it’s michelle, figured i should check we’re fine for tomorrow

“I’m not telling Michelle to go away.” Peter says, as he changes her contact name to ‘MJ’, and also as May walks through the front door.

“I should hope not.” She says, grocery bag clutched in one hand and Indian takeout in the other. “If you want food, you’re going to come and help me with these bags. And you’re going to tell me who Michelle is.”

“She’s in our Academic Decathlon team.” Ned replies, pausing the game. “And also apparently Peter’s new best friend.”

May fake-gasps as Peter takes the bulging bag of groceries from her, and he rolls his eyes. “She is not. And May, you’ve met her. You’ve definitely seen her, at least. We just have to work together for an English thing, that’s all.”

“Well, have her round here!” May says. “I’m not working tomorrow, but I can clear out if you, you know, want some space. I have given you all the right talks, haven’t I?” For the third time today, Peter flushes. This must be some kind of national record. “Aw, you’re blushing! She must be special, huh? Especially if you’re able to find time for her between running off to almost get killed 24/7.” She still hasn’t quite forgiven him for not immediately telling her the truth about that, surprisingly, but Peter’s trying to work on it.

“She’s just a friend!” He insists, placing cereal and coffee in the cupboard. “Honestly, we’ve barely ever talked.” Ned does have to concede to that, and the conversation turns to something else as they sit down for dinner, removing the attention from Peter and giving him the opportunity to pull out his phone and finally reply without facing the Spanish Inquisition

 **You:** that’s cool! my aunt is insisting you come over here tho, so be prepared to retell your entire life story

He’s barely taken another mouthful of lamb vindaloo when a reply comes through

 **MJ:** what if i tell her i’m secretly an assassin who was kidnapped and raised in russia under a brutal training regime

 **You:** She would tell u that your story sounds weirdly like Black Widow’s and then try and get you to talk through all of the psychological trauma that upbringing caused u

 **MJ:** sounds like a great way to spend a saturday afternoon

Peter laughs, causing both May and Ned to look up from their conversation, and sends her his address. She doesn’t reply.

“Michelle’s coming over tomorrow.” He says, slowly. “Please don’t be weird about it. We’re literally just doing English homework.”

“Swear on my life.” May replies, and though she says it jokingly he knows she’s being serious. “It’ll only be a light interrogation. Family, interests, are you actually a hired killer here to take out my nephew? Standard stuff, you know.” Peter scoffs, but doesn’t say anything. “You boys clean up, alright? And please don’t stay up too late. I would like to sleep sometime in the next century.”

“Yes, May.” Both Ned and Peter say, completely in-sync. It’s a habit they’ve had ever since they first became friends. Ben used to make jokes about them being the twins from The Shining, and May would always scold him and say that they’d get curious, look it up, and then be scarred for life. Ben always swore they could all watch it together when Peter and Ned were sixteen, but. There’s now an obvious flaw in that plan.

They go to bed around 1:30am, and Peter had managed to forget about Michelle and his phone enough that he’s shocked to see a notification from her on his screen when he goes to turn it off, received at 12:46am.

 **MJ:** sorry but it’s genuinely distressing to me that you can’t stick to one version of the word ‘you’

 **MJ:** like you said you and then u and then you

 **MJ:** what is the purpose there who does that

 **You:** is this really what you think about this late at night

Did that sound like a come on? It might be a come on. Peter really isn’t sure, given he is potentially the least experienced person at talking to girls there is. There are probably babies out there with more game than him. Why is he even replying now? It’s 1:30 in the morning, why would she be awake? As if she can read his mind or something, a reply pops up instantly.

 **MJ:** it was so distressing i couldn’t sleep. if any of the work i do tomorrow is subpar i’m fully blaming you

 **You:** obviously i am fully responsible

 **You:** but tbh you could hand it something that literally seemed like it was written by a 5 year old and he’d think it was shakespearan level

 **MJ:** yes, but I’d still know it was bad and that’s what would annoy me

 **You:** that’s fair

 **You:** you better try and sleep then

 **You:** i wouldn’t put it past you to like deck me over this

 **MJ:** I’m glad that’s how you feel about me

 **MJ:** night peter

 **You:** night

***

Ned leaves early the next morning, muttering bitterly about some family reunion. May leaves soon after, though not before telling him, not kindly, to tidy his room, because only her and Ned are allowed to see its current garbage dumpster appearance.

“We’re probably not even going to be in my room, oh my god.”

“Still,” she says, scanning the floor. “Just because you can shoot webs out of your hands does not mean you can have other science experiments growing on the plates under your bed.” Peter’s almost tempted to stick his tongue out at her, but then he remembers that he is not in fact five years old.

He’s mildly on edge for the next few hours, for some reason. He never actually specified a time with Michelle, so she could literally just pop up at any time. So far, he’s tidied his room, emptied the dishwasher, and changed his shirt five times. Which frankly is ridiculous, because Michelle’s never cared about clothes a day in her life, his or anyone else’s. He could turn up to school in full on Chewbacca costume, and she’d think he was no more ridiculous than she already thinks he is. She’d probably try and call out inaccuracies, or something.

It’s 12:45 when she knocks on his door, and he’s grateful, because he’s literally just spent the last five minutes staring at the wall in silence. She’s got one of those massive thermos mugs in her hand, probably full of tea, and the sleeves of her sweatshirt are covering her hands all the way to her fingers, and it’s really kind of cute. Not that that has any impact on Peter, obviously.

“I brought some decathlon preparation stuff.” She says, not even bothering to say hello before walking in. “I figured you might need some practice, what with all your recent abandonment.” She scans his apartment once, then turns to him with what he thinks is an approving look.

“Hey, I haven’t missed any trainings in weeks!”

“You’re a real team player.” Michelle replies, completely deadpan. “Now come on, I gotta do some stuff at the library and my mom has a weird thing about me coming home too late, so.”

It actually doesn’t take too long for them to get underway, and before long they’re tossing ideas back and forth. Well. Peter’s tossing ideas at Michelle and she’s rejecting them all, but it’s the thought that counts.

“Fine, what’s your analysis of this scene, oh mighty Shakespeare expert?” Peter asks, after his fifth idea has been shot down.

“Well, Benedick is obviously deceiving Beatrice, right?”

“Yeah.”

“He’s in costume, and he’s letting her believe that it’s somebody else so he can get her opinion on him.”

“Yeah.”

“It’s like if you were in your Spiderman costume and tried to ask me about my thoughts on Peter Parker.”

“Yeah-wait, what, no? What?” Michelle gives him this look, and though sometimes she can be completely indecipherable the message behind it is clear: Do Not Bullshit Me Right Now, Peter Parker. “What-how did you-how do you know?”

“You and Ned are probably the least subtle people known to man.” She says, sighing. “I heard you talking about it in gym. And even if I haven’t heard that I probably would have figured it out because of DC: You mysteriously go missing, you don’t come with us to the Monument, and then a superhero renowned for living in New York just happens to appear there and save all of our friends? It doesn’t take a genius. The fact that no one else has figured you out is astounding.”

“So, when Ned asked you about Spiderman-”

“I was fucking with you.” Michelle smirks. “Kind of a reverse Beatrice/Benedick situation.”

Peter drops his face into his hands. “Jesus Christ, I knew you would have already figured it out.”

“You did, huh?” He can’t see her, but he knows for sure that she’s raising an eyebrow at him. He can practically hear it.

“I was planning on telling you, actually.”

“You’ve been telling me a whole load of things lately.”

“It’s almost as if we’re friends.”

She laughs, softly. “Yeah. Almost as if.”

Peter pulls his face away from his hands, finally, and she’s got that look on her face again. The open one, from yesterday. It seems to be a theme when he confesses things to her. He might have to keep doing it. “So who knows, then?”

“Um, Ned, obviously. May. Tony Stark, and a few people who work with him.”

“Tony-that’s what the internship was, wasn’t it.” It’s not even a question, but he nods anyway. “Wow. Well, please don’t get killed by some evil mastermind, okay? I’d rather die than have to deal with Flash being on the team every event.”

“That’s really the only reason you don’t want me to die?”

“Of course. What other reason would there be?”

“Just checking.”

“Good.”

They eventually get something written down, as Michelle finally stopped rejecting every word that came out of Peter’s mouth. She decides that she doesn’t have to leave just yet, and so they move on to decathlon practice, and suddenly it’s 5:00pm and she still hasn’t left. Peter can’t even remember what he said, but it made her laugh properly for the first time that he’s ever seen. She’s laughed sarcastically, or given out short chuckles before, but this is the first time he’s seen her genuinely lose it. Some of her hair has come out of the messy bun on top of her head, and she has tears streaming down her face, and it’s so shocking and contagious that Peter finds himself in the exact same position. Eventually they calm down enough that they’re sitting in silence, faces close together, and Peter’s hand is on her leg, just above the knee. He doesn’t know how it got there. He doesn’t remember giving it permission to be there. But it’s there. And he isn’t taking it away. Why isn’t he taking it away?

Michelle looks down at his hand and then looks back up, opening her mouth to speak, and probably to tell him to get his hands off of her, when she’s interrupting by May bursting through the front door. Peter handles this very well, naturally by falling off the couch and nearly smashing his head on the coffee table.

“You alright there, sweetheart?” May calls, before her eyes land on Michelle and all attention on him is lost. “You must be Michelle! I’m May, Peter’s aunt. Are you staying for dinner?”    

“I’m, uh, crap, is that the time? Sorry, I’m just-my mom will freak out if I’m not home soon.” Peter’s never seen Michelle this flustered. He should give May an award.

“No problem! We’ll drop you home.”

“No, really, it’s okay-”

“I insist. Peter, get off the floor and get your shoes. I’ll put this milk in the fridge and then we’ll go.”

Michelle tries to fight it a little longer, but May refuses to back down, and soon she accepts. May manages to get a little interrogation in on the way home, founding out about her family (“Two brothers, mom and dad.”), her hometown (“born and raised in Queens”), and her ideal career (“something political”). This somehow launches into a very passionate discussion featuring phrases such as "institutionalized racism" and "prison industrial complex" and "those garbage white dude senators who value their NRA blood money over the lives of children." Peter understands that there is a time and place for his opinion, and this is certainly not the time or place. When they get to her house, Michelle leaves the car with a smile and a promise to come around for dinner next week. May doesn’t even bother to look at Peter as they drive away, just says: “She’s something, huh?”

“Yeah she’s um-she’s great. Really great.”

“She’s good for you.” She rolls her eyes when Peter stutters. “I don’t mean it that way. I love Ned, you know I do, and I’d be happy if he’s the only person you ever wanted to be friends with, but it’s always good to extend yourself, you know? And besides, you do not get to give me that look anyway. I saw you two before you ceremoniously fell off the couch.”

“We’re not even- we only really just became friends, okay? I don’t even know if I- you know.”

“Does she know about the whole,” May waves her right hand “Spider thing?”

He nods. “She figured it out.”

“She’s pretty clever, then?”

“Really clever.” Peter’s smiling before he even realises what’s happening. “And she knows it, you know? But not in an obnoxious way. She just has faith in herself. She knows what she’s capable of. She could probably take over the world, in just a weekend.”

May takes her eyes off the road for just a second to look suspiciously his way, which is how he knows it’s serious, because she’s usually a stickler for road rules. “For someone you’ve only just become friends with, you seem to know a lot about her.” When Peter tries to come up with some half assed excuse, she laughs. “I’m just teasing, you know I am. I just think it’d be good for you to have more people in your life, you know? To help you not be as weighed down by all this superhero stuff. As long as they’re, y’know, human.”

“My Chitauri boyfriend actually just messaged me, so…”

“Oh, be quiet.” She laughs, and then immediately launches into a story about a weird guy who she met at the supermarket earlier.

He doesn’t mention the afternoon to Ned at all. What would he even say? He accidentally had hand to leg contact with Michelle and is still having a conniption about it two days later? He thinks he could potentially in the future develop feelings for her? He might have already started, despite not knowing her all that well? He would literally never hear the end of it. And besides, Michelle seems to be completely unbothered by it, since she sat with them at both morning break and lunch and managed to start a debate on whether pineapple belongs on pizza, and also steal half of Ned’s lunch.

“Why don’t you steal Peter’s?” Ned questions, while Michelle takes yet another Dorito from the small orange bag in front of him.

“He needs the protein.” She quickly stuffs the chip in her mouth and swallows before continuing: “You know, now he’s a superhero and all. Can’t have him fainting from low blood sugar while saving people from a collapsing building.”

“Dude, you told her?”

“I actually figured it out myself, thanks.”

“Does this mean she’s part of the team now? Are we your team?”

“Um, I’m not part of anyone’s team, sorry.”

“What if we had a name?”

“If you came up with a good enough name, sure.”

They bicker on for a while, and if Peter’s honest, he just kind of zones out. Finally, the bell rings and Michelle kicks him in the shin to let him know that “it’s time to go to Chem, asshole”, forcing him out of his stupor and onto his feet. The subject passes in a blur of bonding and energy changes. As he’s walking out the door to go home, Michelle grabs him by the arm and pulls him against the lockers, and Peter is struck by the very real fear that she’s about to attack him for Saturday, but then he takes one look at her face and she looks-nervous. He’s seen a variety of expressions on her face before, some of them very interesting, but he’s never seen her look nervous. It’s bizarre.

“Hey, so, this is gonna sound weird but, you know how your aunt made me promise to come over for dinner?”

“Yeah, she’s asked me five different times over the last two days whether I’ve solidified a date with you yet.”

“Yeah, well, I was wondering-is Friday okay? And since, you know, I’ll already be at your house and everything, can I, um. Stay over? It’s just, my parents are going out of town and they don’t like me being in an empty house and to be honest, I don’t really like it either and-”

“Michelle! Hey, it’s fine. May will be freaking thrilled, trust me. Besides, if she found out I let you stay home alone, she’d probably kick me out, drive to your house and make you come back to ours with her.”

She laughs shyly for a moment. “Cool.”

"Cool."

"Excellent."

"Great."

"Fantastic."

"Amazing."

"Spectacular."

"Are we ever going to leave, or are we just going to stand here saying synonyms of cool forever?"

"Yup, we're trapped for the rest of time." She says, solemnly. Peter laughs, and then she smiles, and they're looking at each other for an amount of time which should be weird. But it isn't weird. Which is maybe the weirdest thing about it. "Really though, I should go."

"Yeah, no, same, I got-"

"Yeah-"

"See you tomorrow?"

"Of course." She smirks. "And Peter?"

"Yeah?"

"If you mention to anyone I’m scared of being home alone I will actually have to kill you."

“I wouldn’t expect anything else.”

May, as predicted, is thrilled, and doesn’t even make any jokes about the fact that it’s Michelle staying over, which Peter appreciates. The next day in English Mr Park, also as predicted, loves her thoughts on Act 2, Scene 1, and spends half of the lesson discussing the different themes that exist simply within that one scene. With any other teacher, the entire class would have probably gone to sleep, but Mr Park is special. He’s genuinely funny and cool, and kind of hot, if Peter’s type was married forty-year-old English teachers. He also, thankfully, does not set them any homework, so Peter is free to put on the suit and look after the neighbourhood for a while. One of May’s conditions was that he stopped leaving his bag in open public places, so he stops home for five minutes for a snack and to put on his suit under his clothes, which he’ll take off on the roof of his building. As inconspicuous as it would be to climb out of his window in full costume in broad daylight, he figures it isn’t really a risk he should take.

He rescues a toy from a storm water drain for a kid, and leaves a guy who’d been following two girls from Peter’s school home dangling from an overpass by his ankle, so overall, it’s an okay day. He’s sitting on top of a McDonald’s sign, looking out across the city, when he sees Michelle exit the library across the street. As if she has some kind of sixth sense which means she can feel him looking at her, her head twists up and she stares at him as she begins to make her way across the (relatively busy, he might add) street. He quickly swings into a nearby alley, not to avoid her, just to avoid any public attention she might bring by interacting with him in the suit. When she finally appears, she just tilts her head at him and rolls her eyes, before clutching her face in both hands and adopting a faux-excited tone.

“Oh my God, Spiderman, this is so exciting, can I have your autograph? Can I have a selfie? Oh my God, I can’t believe I’m meeting a real-life superhero, this is so crazy!”

“Yeah, alright, you don’t have to be like that.” He says as she cackles and then moves closer. “Come on, don’t exact like you wouldn’t act that exact way if you were faced with a superhero you actually admired.”

“Who says I don’t admire you?” She says, and he’s not entirely sure if she’s joking. Whether she is or not, it still makes his heart have an interesting spasm. “And besides, I’m a professional. I would save the embarrassing behaviour for _after_ they’d gone, obviously.”

“Obviously.”

“So, this is really what you do, then? Sit on top of fast food signs and lurk in alleyways?”

Peter huffs indignantly. “I’m not lurking, I’m just-”

“Waiting in here for a teenage girl?”

“You know what, it’s like you want me to be a creep.”

“Hey, I’m just stating the facts.”

“What can I do to make you stop making me out to be some kind of perv?”

“Give me a ride home?” There’s only bravado in her tone, but her faces betrays a tiny bit of anxiety.

“You mean like-with my webs?”

“No, with your car that’s parked right outside this alley. Yes, with your webs. Come on. What’s the point in being friends with Spiderman if you don’t get the perks?”

Peter sighs. “And here I was thinking you liked me for my stellar personality.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time you got something wrong. Anyway, come on, how are we going to do this?”

Peter puts a hand on his chest in mock-upset as she moves closer to him. “You know, you’re really hurting me. I don’t even feel like helping you out anymore.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure,” She waves her hands. “Just tell me where to put my hands, alright?” She definitely said something about not wanting to die after that, but for some reason the first sentence made Peter’s brain short circuit. He needs to say something. He needs to reply. Why can’t he reply? She didn’t mean anything by it, she was just asking him for direction. Sort yourself out Parker, Jesus, she’s definitely going to think you’re weird if you don’t say anything right now.

“Neck.” Wow, good job. “You should put your arms around my neck. That’d be the um. The best way. Oh, and-” He pulls the hood of her jacket up over her head. “It’d probably be better if people didn’t, you know. Recognise you.”

“Good point.” She wraps her arms around his neck, and suddenly her entire body is pressed against his, and wow, Peter really didn’t think this through at all. Like, at all. She’s going to move a specific way, and he’s going to get so distracted that he’ll forget to shoot another web, and then they’ll both fall and die, all because of his stupid teenage boy brain and its stupid hormones. “Hey, are you with me?”

“Wha-yeah, uh huh, yup.”

“I need you to drop me at the street over from my house.” Michelle says, completely unaware of their obvious impending doom. “I really do not need my parents or any of my neighbours noticing that I’m hanging out with Spiderman.”

“Are you ashamed of me?” He gasps, and it’s a relief that he’s actually managed to regain control of his ability to speak. Michelle just glares, and doesn’t even bother to respond.

Thankfully, they do make it to their destination fully alive and well. There was one moment where Michelle pressed her face into his neck and laughed, mouth right against his collarbone, and Peter did just kind of accept death right then and there. Fortunately, they did not actually die, and Michelle’s kind of yelling at him about how “that was the best, I can’t believe you do this every day, can we do this every day?” It’s the most animated he’s ever seen her, and it’s all kinds of cute. And he gets it, honestly. It doesn’t matter how many times he swings around, it still fills him with an adrenaline rush matched by nothing else.

Before he even realises what’s happening, she’s checked her watch, pressed a kiss to his cheek, and run off. The kiss was over the suit, obviously, but his skin’s tingling like it wasn’t. Co-incidentally, he also makes it home that day in record time.

He might as well acknowledge it now. He definitely has a crush on Michelle. It can only end badly, but, well. As long as her dad isn’t an actual supervillain, it’s already going better than the last crush he had.

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday go by completely without incident. Michelle doesn’t ask him if he can take her out again, or even mention that he did in the first place, and she definitely doesn’t mention the kiss, which essentially confirms his suspicion it was an impulsive, adrenaline rush action. It’s only when they’re walking back to his place after school on Friday that he realises she’s actual going to be sleeping at his house. In his bed. Not with him, of course, above him on the top bunk, but. Still. She’ll only be a metre away. He liked Liz for months and she never even _saw_ his house, and Michelle’s going to be in it. In his room. For the second time.

“Hey,” she clicks her fingers in front of his face, as he’s quite obviously not with her. “Are you listening to me?”

“Yeah! Sorry, it’s just-long week, you know? I’m glad it’s over.”

“And now, you get to have a thrilling night with me.” He wishes that she’d think about her word choice, sometimes, if only for the sake of his mental health and stability. “Come on, cheer up! I’m about to become best friends with your aunt! I’ll be a new member of your family, and you’ll have to be around me forever!”

Peter just keeps his mouth shut, because if he opens it he’ll probably end up saying something overwhelmingly intense and embarrassing like “I’d like that.” Why can’t he ever just have a casual crush on someone? Why does it always turn into this? He doesn’t deserve it.

They don’t talk a lot on the way home, but it isn’t uncomfortable. That’s one of the things that’s different between Liz and Michelle. With Liz, he either completely lost the ability to speak, or he’d feel the need to fill the silence with inane conversation. With Michelle, he doesn’t even think about what he is, or isn’t, saying. He just feels calm, for once, in a world where he rarely gets to feel calm.

Not that Liz isn’t great, of course, but if he’s being realistic he knows it never would have worked, even if he had been able to speak more than two consecutive sentences to her without embarrassing himself and wanting to die. And her dad hadn’t been a gigantic evil dick who had tried to kill Peter on multiple occasions. She was a senior! In what world would she have sincerely considered dating him. Seriously.

Before he knows it, they’re at his apartment. Michelle managed to find space in her ridiculously huge bag amongst all the books to put her pyjamas and clothes, so she didn’t have to bother going back to her house first. May’s already home when they arrive, and she grins when she sees Michelle.

“So, I was thinking,” She says, as they throw their bags into Peter’s room. “At the risk of sounding completely lazy, we could just go to that Thai place for dinner. I don’t want to scare Michelle off with my terrible cooking immediately.”

“And we get a discount there.” Peter turns to Michelle and stage whispers: “One of the guys who works there is in looooove with May.”

“You shush.” May replies, waving her hand at him as if trying to shoo away his words midair. “I also had a very interesting talk with Mr Delmar coming home from work today. Apparently his daughters been asking after you a lot, says she misses seeing you in the shop now that it’s gone.” Peter ducks his head, and he can practically feel Michelle’s eyes on the side of his face. Her expression is unreadable for a splitsecond after he looks up, but quickly changes to one of amusement.

“First Liz, now Mr Delmar’s daughter. You’re breaking girls hearts left and right, Peter.”

“I did not break-she didn’t even-shut up!” He retorts, but there’s no heat behind it, and she cackles, and then announces that “it’s cute when you get worked up like this.” There’s a beat, as if she’s realised what she just said. May, thankfully, doesn’t even hesitate, just immediately starts talking about Mr Delmar and his rebuild plans. Michelle won’t quite look him in the eyes for a while, but it’s okay. Soon enough they’re laughing and joking like normal, and fighting over which movie they should watch. Michelle wants something dramatic and political, Peter wants sci-fi and action, and the Netflix selection is so bare they almost have to give up. They finally make a decision on Train to Busan, which May takes one look at as she comes in to tell them that they’re leaving for dinner, and adds an additional announcement that she is definitely staying in her room for the rest of the night, thanks.

Michelle is more talkative than Peter at dinner, which is shocking on so many levels. It’s not that she necessarily has problems with talking in general; she’s more than willing to share her opinion on any given topic with any number of people, or yell at them if she thinks theirs is wrong, but actual, friendly, not-one sided conversation? Not really her strong point. Especially with people she’s only met once before. It took months for her to speak more than once sentence to Ned and Peter, and yet she’s chatting away to May like they’re actual friends. Which is good, Peter figures. It’d be much worse if they hated each other. She’s talking about things even Peter didn’t know about, about her family and her early life and her future, and it’s nice. It’s nice that she feels comfortable enough to share this kind of stuff. She’s always been somewhat of a mystery to him.

The waiter comes along, like he always does, and provides them with a free dish. This time it’s a plate of vegetarian spring rolls, which he delivers with a clumsy wink. Michelle and Peter both manage to hold in their laughs until he’s left their table, and then they collapse as May looks on in disapproval.

“Oh man, I see what you mean, that guy has got it bad.” Michelle says, before covering her mouth with her hand. May tries to insist that he’s just being nice, but Michelle shakes her head. “Waiters are paid to be nice. That guy is definitely going above and beyond.”

“She’s right.”

“I always am, Parker.”

“Settle down, you two.” May laughs, shaking her head. “And finish your food! If some of it’s free, we gotta eat it all, alright?”

“Of course.” Peter replies, trying very hard to keep a straight face and not give away the fact that he and Michelle are engaged in a pretty severe kicking war under the table. It ends when he accidentally drops his fork on the ground after receiving a pretty brutal kick to the shin, which he semi-successfully manages to play off as a freak accident, which Michelle looks on, completely innocently.

They do manage to finish all of their food, including the complimentary spring rolls, and when they get back to the apartment May hugs them both before disappearing to her room. Michelle looks a little shocked at first, but eventually she smiles.

“Your aunt’s really nice.” She says finally, as Peter’s setting up Netflix on the TV. “I can see why you guys are so close.” She sounds wistful, almost, and Peter stays silent, hoping she’ll keep going. She does. “I love my parents, and I know they love me, but. We couldn’t be as casual as you guys are, you know? It’s not the same. And I guess every teenager feels like this at some stage, but I feel like they just don’t know me sometimes. They do make an effort, but it’s just. I don’t know.”

“Do they know that you’re-”

“Bi? No. It’s not they’re raging homophobes or anything. They’re both Democrats. My mom was going to anti-Reagan protests at age 12, but-It’ll still be weird, you know? Every time I do something different, they have to make such a massive deal out of it, and I just don’t want that. I don’t want it to be a big deal. Does May know? About you?”

“Yeah. I told her when I was ten.” Michelle looks at him in shock. “It wasn’t like-I don’t think I even realised at the time. I didn’t really think about it. We were in the car with Ben, and she was asking me if there was anyone at school who I had a crush on, and I said this guy Jared, and then proceeded to spend the next twenty minutes talking about him. They didn’t make it a big deal, and it was fine. We never sat down and had a big discussion about it, it was just a given, you know?”

Michelle smiles a small, but genuine, smile. It’s really kind of breath-taking. “Maybe I should have done that when I was ten. It’s definitely make things a _lot_ easier.”

“Hey, you’ll get there.” Peter’s almost tempted to stretch out and squeeze her hand, but she might actually punch him. As if she can feel his oncoming bad decision, she says: “Not that I’m not a huge fan of this emotional crap but. You promised me Train to Busan.”

“That I did.” He smiles, and grabs the remote. “I’m sure this’ll get rid of all the emotional crap.”

That last statement is ironic, given they end the movie practically sitting on each other, tears streaming down their faces. They’d managed to make it through the first half of the movie without incident, jokingly yelling at the passengers on the train for their terrible decisions, but Michelle had grabbed his hand when the main group had passed by the zombies by climbing above them on the luggage compartment, and then just hadn’t let go. They slowly moved closer and closer together as the movie progressed, pressed together from thigh to shoulder, which is how Peter realised that she was shuddering through the entire last scene. He doesn’t know why he’s shocked. It’s a freaking sad scene. He just figured-he doesn’t even know what he figured. Regardless of what it is, he’s wrong.

The movie ends, but they’re left sitting there still. Neither of them really know how to process what just happened, and they’re still holding hands, holding so tightly that the skin around Peter’s knuckles is stark white.

“Well, that was-”

“Soul destroying.”

“I was going to say interesting, but yeah, soul destroying works.” Michelle’s laugh is watery as she tries to subtly wipe away her stray tears with her left hand. “I didn’t even realise-Jesus. The shoulder of my top is wet, how much were you crying?”

“Oh, so it was just me, then?”

“I have never cried a day in my life, thank you.” It’s not even that funny. It’s really not funny, but Peter’s so hyped up from the movie and from being so close to her that he just kind of loses his shit. He’s crying again, from laughter this time, and so is she, and they both quickly realise that they’re definitely not going to be sleeping any time soon. Of course, they’re then asleep within the first ten minutes of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.

Peter’s first realisation upon waking the next morning is that he isn’t in his bedroom like he usually is. His second realisation is that someone is lying on him, and that someone’s hair is in his mouth, and that someone is in fact Michelle. His third, and probably most horrifying realisation is that his aunt May is currently standing at the end of the couch, staring down at him. He moves to stand, but she puts one hand out in a sign to stop, and uses the other to put a finger to her mouth.

“We’ll talk about this later, alright? Just don’t wake her.”

He relaxes again, infinitesimally, and she rolls her eyes before walking over to the kitchen area. Peter just kind of lies there, supremely unsure of what to do. One of his feet is planted on the ground, and his other leg is trapped by both of Michelle’s own. Her face is pressed right into his neck, and her warm breath against it is definitely making something in his spine tingle. Though he might just have slept on it weirdly. He’s just managed to move out from under her and put a blanket over her when she rises suddenly, looking at him in confusion for a second before realising where she is.

“You, uh, fell asleep on the couch last night and I didn’t want to wake you, so I just left you here.” He says the last part looking right at May, hoping she won’t decide to call him out on it and embarrass him, and fortunately she doesn’t. Michelle doesn’t even question it, just nods and asks where the toilet is. She also doesn’t notice that he’s wearing the same clothes from last night, and he manages to get into his room and pull on some sweatpants and a new t-shirt before she comes out of the bathroom.

“You guys were pretty quiet last night.” May says, tone a little too casual for Peter to feel entirely comfortable. “Usually I gotta yell at Ned and Peter at least once before I can get to sleep. You should come round more often.”

Michelle snorts. “Yeah, they’re not always the quietest of guys.”

“You’re telling me. I had to deal with this one.” She jerks a thumb at Peter, which, ow. “At age eleven. It was pretty damn exhausting.”

“As much fun as it is to stand here and listen to you two insult me, can we move on, thanks? Thank you.”

May pats his cheek as he passes by her to get a glass of water. “You know I love you, buddy. Now grab the flour from the pantry, I’m gonna make pancakes.”

“Oh no, you don’t have to-” May shushes Michelle before she can even finish her sentence.

“These are as much for me as they are for you, trust me. You’re giving me an excuse to make them and not feel guilty about it. You want a drink? Coffee, or-”

“Tea.” Peter interrupts, looking over at Michelle. “I mean, you like tea, right?”

“Yeah.” She says, looking a little stunned. Peter can relate. He doesn’t really know where the outburst came from. “Tea would be great.”

“Okay!” May continues, seemingly oblivious to what just happened. “Tea for Michelle, coffee for me, and pancakes for everyone!”

Breakfast passes without Peter making any more random outbursts, which is always nice. Michelle leaves soon after, thanking them for letting her stay. Well, she thanks May. She punches Peter in the shoulder, not exactly gently, and tells him that she’ll “see you at school, champ.” As soon as she’s out the door, May turns to him, point blank, and asks:

“Alright, what is going on between you two? And don’t tell me that you’re ‘just friends’. Ned’s never fallen asleep on top of you like that before.”

“We’re not-” May raises her eyebrows at him. “I swear! We’re not together, okay, but I. You know. I’d like to be. I don’t know about her, though.”

“Have you tried talking to her about it?”

“Are you kidding? No, of course I haven’t. You know how I was with Liz, how I am with everyone! And this actually-it actually means something. Everyone I’ve liked before, they’ve always been unattainable. They weren’t people I was super close with. It was easy, because I knew that nothing would ever genuinely happen, and if it did and didn’t work out, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. But I’m actually friends with Michelle, you know? I liked her before I had feelings for her, and I like having her in my life, and I really, really don’t want to screw that up. Plus, Ned would definitely get pissed. He denies it, but he really likes having her around as well, and I couldn’t mess that up for them just because I what? Have a crush on someone? It’s just easier if I don’t bother. For everyone.”

“Yeah, but I’m pretty sure Ned would also want you to be happy.”

“I am happy! I don’t need to be in a relationship with her to be happy.”

“Sometimes the world isn’t as simple as what you need.” May sighs. “Not to get all gross and sappy on you, but you don’t always have to think about things in terms of what you need. You’re allowed to have what you want, as well. It’s not a crime. I know you’re all self-sacrificing superhero, but you gotta allow yourself happiness, too. And I know that I might seem too serious about this, but if there’s anything I’ve learned over the last few years, it’s that life is really short.” She laughs, but it isn’t happy. “It’s really short and you gotta take those moments of happiness, okay? You’ll miss them if you don’t.”

Peter doesn’t hesitate, just pulls her into a hug. She laughs again, this time out of embarrassment. “God, sorry. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.”

“Hey, you don’t have to apologise, okay? Not to me. Not about this.”

“How’d you get so great, huh?”

“The people who raised me, they were pretty good. Managed to deal with me even when I was an annoying little twelve-year-old, which essentially makes them superheroes in my eyes.”

“They sound pretty great.”

“They are.” Peter tries to pretend that his voice didn’t just crack. “They’re the best.” He sways them back and forth for a while, and eventually she pulls away, pressing the heels of her palms to her eyes to get rid of the last tears.

“You did get what I said though, right? You should be happy, and I’m not just talking about Michelle. I know you feel like you have to carry everyone else’s burden, like everyone’s lives depend on you, but they don’t. And I know you well enough to know that saying this will have essentially no impact in changing that, but. Just try, sometimes. Maybe. And also, go shower. Sweaty couch smell is not a good scent for you.”

“Really? I thought it was nice.”

“It’s one way to make sure no person goes near you ever again, is what it is.”

He would say that’s rude, but it’s probably right.

***

He decides that while he’s not quite up to having That discussion with Michelle just yet, he does take May’s advice to tell Ned. Partially because he’s his best friend and he likes being honest, and partially because Ned hasn’t quite forgiven him for not even planning to tell him about the whole Spiderman thing, and he figures he wouldn’t be happy about not being in the know about this. Also, he’ll find it hilarious, which will hopefully give him a new topic to give Peter shit about.

He nudges Ned while they’re sitting in Biology 4th period, because their teacher doesn’t really care what they do or how much they talk as long as they’re able to pass the weekly tests she gives them.

“Hey, so, you know Michelle?”

“I’m going to assume you mean Jones, so yeah.”

“And you know how we’re like, friends now.”

“Yes, I am aware. Oh God, what did you do? Did you piss her off? Is she going to set fire to our bags or something?”

Peter pulls a face at him. “No, dude, Jesus, why’d you assume I’d pissed her off?”

“What else-Oh my God.”

“What?”

“I know what this is.”

“What is it, then?”

Ned sighs. “You like her, don’t you.” It isn’t phrased as a question, and he takes Peter’s lack of response as a confirmation. “Michelle? Academic Decathlon Michelle? Michelle who threatens both of us with physical violence on a weekly, if not daily, basis? Is that like, a weird thing you’re into or something?”

“Ned! Jesus!” Peter looks around, but fortunately no-one seems to have heard them. Yet. “No, it’s not-I didn’t plan this, okay? It just sort of happened. And I really, really like her, and I really, really don’t know what to do about it. And I just wanted to come to you, because I don’t know what to do, and as much as I love May it’s still a little weird talking to her about this stuff.”

“May knows? Are you freaking kidding me?”

“She called me out on it like, immediately. I swear she has a sixth sense.”

“Wow.” Ned slumps back in his chair. “I mean, I guess I could see it. But what happens if you guys go out and forget about me completely? What if you break up and our group dynamic is ruined?”

“Both of those scenarios do require her liking me back, so. We’re a long way off, I think. You probably don’t need to worry too much.” The bell rings for lunch, and soon enough they’re sitting in the cafeteria, trays on the table in front of them. “And come on, on the incredible slim chance that she does, do you really think we’d just abandon you like that? Do you really think _I’d_ just abandon you like that?”

“Why would Peter abandon you?” Michelle asks, slumping onto the seat beside Peter as she throws her bag haphazardly under the table.

“If, um-”

“I asked Peter whether he’d save me or Tony Stark from a burning building. He chose me.” Peter sends him a questioning look over the table as Michelle is busy searching for something in her bag, and Ned just shrugs.

“Huh.” She turns to Peter once she’s got her head out from under the table and looks him dead in the eye. “Would it be the same for me? Would you save me from a burning building instead of Tony Stark?”

“Of course.” His voice seemed to have climbed three octaves. “Of course. I’d always save you.” Wow, why don’t you just propose to her right now, Jesus Christ.

“Besides,” Ned interjects suddenly, probably trying to save Peter from further embarrassment. “Tony could probably save himself from a burning building, I mean, he’s Iron Man.”

“Of course.”

“Obviously.”

There’s an awkward silence, and Ned keeps trying to catch his eye, but Peter’s refusing to look anywhere but out the window to their left. He really is a master of subtlety.

“If you guys have stopped being weird by the end of the day, we have Academic Decathlon practice after school. Mr Harrington decided we need to get more focused now we’re the national champions and everything.”

“Shouldn’t that mean we get to relax?” Ned asks through a groan, and drops his head onto his folded arms.

“Apparently not. But it means you get to spend even more time with me. Don’t you want that, Leeds?”

He mutters something that sounds suspiciously like “I know _one_ person who wants that.” Peter might have to find a way to permanently web his mouth closed, if only to make sure that literally all of his secrets don’t get exposed in the next week. Michelle thankfully either doesn’t notice or doesn’t bother to comment, and they manage to move on relatively fast.

Nothing much happens in Academic Decathlon practice, either. Michelle throws a card at Flash’s face after he makes a particularly irritating comment towards Peter, and he ends up going on a five-minute rant about how she almost blinded him before storming off when all she does is laugh in his face. Mr Harrington doesn’t even bother to try and stop him. So much for the team being more focused. Ned makes a point to raise his eyebrows at Peter every time he so much as looks at Michelle. How he hasn’t accidentally told everyone that Peter is Spiderman yet is a genuine mystery.

***

“Fundamentally, Much Ado about Nothing is very much a story about love.” Mr Park announces on Wednesday in English, ten minutes from the end of the lesson. “There is love between many of the characters. Beatrice and Benedick, for example, have always loved each other, but the strength of those feelings and their fear of them causes them both to bury them under false hatred and indifference. It’s only when they experience tragedy together, Claudio’s public shaming of Hero and her subsequent ‘death’, do they truly acknowledge their true feelings to each other. Can we think of any other stories in media similar to this?”

Betty Brant puts up her hand. “Pride and Prejudice.”

Mr Park claps his hands together once, suddenly, forcing everyone who previously hadn’t been paying attention to focus on him. “Pride and Prejudice, exactly! Darcy is too proud to acknowledge his feelings for Elizabeth until half way through the novel, and Elizabeth is both too proud and too stubborn to do the same until the end. It took both the ‘tragedy’ of Lydia eloping and almost ruining their family name, and Darcy’s heroic actions in organising her marriage to save it for Elizabeth to come to terms with the fact that not only does he truly love her, but she loves him too.

It’s a very common reaction for humans, I think, to try and push away feelings like these. It won’t always result in pretending to hate the other person as a means of disguising them, but the fear of both being vulnerable in front of another person and potentially being rejected by that person means that they refuse to outwardly acknowledge the existence of their feelings. At the risk of sounding like some try-hard youth counsellor, I’m sure almost all of you have had experience with this in some shape or form, though maybe not to the extreme of absolute true love that both of these stories feature.” There are a few laughs throughout the class. “Though maybe you have. Or it’s felt like it, at least. Who would know.”

The bell rings just as he finishes his sentence. “That’s it for today, chairs up, thank you. There’s no homework, unless you want to review your Much Ado notes. See you tomorrow!” Peter stands up, and tries to act as if he doesn’t currently feel like dying, given he just had to spend ten minutes sitting next to the girl he likes and listening to someone talk about hidden feelings. It’s good. Life is good, and everything’s fine, and he handling things incredibly well, thanks.

To be fair, if he thought that was bad, the rest of his day is incomparably worse.

He stops a kidnapping. He saw two guys throw three girls, all probably under the age of eight, with the hands, feet and mouths bound, into the back of a white van. An honest to God windowless white van, like they’re in some shitty B thriller movie. Peter can’t even find the humour in it. He’s too busy trying not to throw up.

He catches up to them at the lights intersection between 66th and 108th, where they’re stopped at a red. There’s nobody stopped behind them, so he takes the opportunity to rip the back doors off of the van and pull the girls out before the drivers even realise what’s going on. The people coming up behind him start honking and yelling, but somehow must realise what’s happening, because they all soon stop.

It’s kind of a blur after that. He knows he stopped the guys, but he doesn’t remember how. He remembers people trying to talk to him, but he doesn’t remember responding. He knows that the police were going to turn up, but he didn’t stay. It was too much. Everyone was looking at him, and talking, and the girls were crying, and they’re just kids, they’re so young, and Peter doesn’t know what to do, how to fix it, and he can’t breathe, he can’t be here right now.

And suddenly he’s at Michelle’s house, outside her bedroom window, and he’s knows it’s her bedroom because her snapchats are always of the massive red maple tree outside her window, and the walls of the room inside are plastered with posters, and there’s books everywhere, and there is no way it could be anyone but Michelle’s. His mask came off, somehow. He might have taken it off. He doesn’t know. At that very second, she walks into her room, mug in hand, and promptly drops it when she sees Peter outside her window, which is fair. She really should have her curtains closed, it’s almost 10pm.

He sees her turn and yell something, presumably to her parents, before hurriedly closing her door and pulling her window open, and suddenly he’s inside her room. He’d probably be enjoying this moment more if he didn’t feel like he was about to die, if he could actually breathe properly. She’s trying to talk to him, but her voice sounds like she’s underwater, like she’s too far away for him to be able to hear. All he can think about is those girls, and how they could have been taken away, and how it could have gone so, so wrong. He doesn’t know why he’s freaking out about this. He’s saved children before, saved babies before, and yet this is what’s getting to him. He can’t even think about what might have happened if he hadn’t been there. He can’t even consider it. They were so young. They were so fucking young, and now they’re going to be traumatised because of those two gigantic assholes, and he doesn’t even know what’s going to happen to them.

“Hey, hey, Peter, Peter, I need you to look at me, alright? I need you to breathe with me.”

“I can’t.”

“Yes you can, yes you can. It’s going to be fine, okay. I need you to breathe. I’m going to count to five, and then you’re going to inhale, and then I’m going to count to five again, and you’re going to exhale, alright? You got that?” He nods. “Good, okay. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.” He inhales, tries not to think about the girls. “1, 2, 3, 4, 5.” He breathes out, looks at Michelle’s face. Her expression is calm, open, but there’s an unmistakeable element of panic in her eyes. “We’re gonna do that again, alright? As many times as you need.”

They continue for a while, until Peter’s breathing regulates. He’s shaking, and he feels like he might cry, but. He’s calm now. He’s not panicking. He can breathe. Those girls are okay. They’re okay. He saved them, and they’re okay. Michelle covers one of his trembling hands with her own, cups her other hand to his face and kisses him on the forehead. It’s a calming gesture, an affectionate one, and it does help Peter’s brain go silent.

“Sorry about, um, scaring you, and the tea and everything.”

“It’s _fine._ ” She breathes out. “You’re just lucky my parents didn’t bother to investigate. I told them I accidentally walked into a wall.”

“Copying my excuses now, huh?” His voice is so quiet. He’s so tired. He just wants to sleep.

“Yeah, well. I’m actually good at lying, so they work.” Her hand is still on his face, and she’s looking at him in this way he’s never seen before, and it’s not a romantic moment, exactly. He did just have a panic attack, after all. But it’s-something. A monumental change in their relationship, definitely. “Come on, you’re sleeping here tonight. And do not even try to fight me on this. You look like you’re about to collapse. Do you want me to call May, or can you do it?”

“I can-I should do it. She probably would have seen something on the news, so.”

“Okay. I’m gonna go see if I can quietly find any clothes that can fit you, because you are not sleeping in your suit. Try not to be too loud.”

“Sure.” He turns on his phone as she leaves the room, only to see 3 missed calls and multiple messages from May. “Shit.” He dials her number.

She doesn’t even give him time to speak. “I saw the news, Peter, you stopped a kidnapping and then disappeared? Are you kidding me? Are you okay? Where are you, I’m coming to get you.”

“May, May, May, no, no, no, it’s fine, I’m fine. I’m at MJ’s.”

“MJ.”

“Oh, uh, Michelle’s. May, please, I’m fine. Don’t bother coming out here. I freaked out, and she helped me, and I just need some time to-”

“It’s okay, Peter.” She sighs. “I get it. But I hate when you go off the grid like that, you know I do.”

“I know, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t even know what was happening. I didn’t know what I was doing. I’m not gonna do that again, okay? I promise.”

She sighs again, and he can practically hear her holding her face in her hands. “I just worry, Peter. It’s not easy, and I know that what you do isn’t easy for you, and I know you feel like you have to, but.”

“I know, May, I’m sorry, I just-”

“I know. It’s alright. I’ll call school for you tomorrow, you don’t have to go in. But you do have to come home, okay?”

“I will. Love you.”

“Love you too.” She hangs up, and he looks up to see Michelle standing in the doorway, holding up a hugely oversized fluorescent orange t-shirt and wearing an apologetic expression.

“This is all I could find.” She says after closing the door again, voice low. Peter stands and takes it from her hands.

“Where did this even come from?”

“I genuinely could not tell you. It might have been one of my brothers? Though why he bought it is a mystery. I’ll, uh, turn around so you can-” She awkwardly crosses the room to shut her curtains, and stays facing them.

“Oh, yeah, thanks.” He quickly pulls off the suit and pulls on the t-shirt, silently thanking every deity out there that he decided on plain boxer shorts, rather than his Star Wars ones printed with mini Han Solos, Millennium Falcons, and Chewbaccas. The next few minutes pass in a blur, but this is one more motivated by exhaustion, rather than disassociation and panic, which is nice. He doesn’t even realise that he’s actually sharing a bed with her until she turns the light out and rolls next to him, and their arms aren’t quite touching, but he knows she’s there, and it’s comforting enough to allow him to fall into sleep easily.

He wakes up to a shrieking alarm and Michelle sliding her arm out from where it’s around his torso and underneath his own arm, which is definitely an interesting development. It’s still dark outside, no light coming from the edges of the curtains, and Michelle must have turned off the alarm, because it’s silent, apart from her yawn.

“I’m gonna go tell my parents I’m sick, alright? Don’t-go anywhere.” Peter isn’t awake enough to respond, and he’s asleep again by the time she comes back, so he doesn’t notice that she puts her arm around him again so they’re in the same position they were before.

It’s 10 o’clock before he wakes up again, and Michelle’s sitting at her desk reading. She turns when he sits up and stretches, and puts down her book. “Morning, sleepyhead. You snore.”

“I do not!”

“You definitely do. I got a maximum of one hours sleep last night. I’m about to collapse from exhaustion.”

“Shut up.” He throws a pillow at her, which she easily dodges. Her stomach rumbles, suddenly and loudly, which they take as a sign that it’s time for breakfast. Peter basically inhales an entire bowl of cereal while Michelle watches on, semi-disdainfully, and then sighs. “What?” He asks, once he’s finished and put his bowl down. She squints at him.

“Stand up.”

“What?”

“Stand up!” She says, lifting both of her hands, palms facing upwards. “Come on.” He stands, and she walks around the counter so that they’re standing across from each other, about a foot apart. “Okay, I’m gonna do something, and you’re not gonna freak out, alright? Don’t like, become a stuttering mess.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Shut up.” Michelle says, then leans forward and kisses him. It’s short, barely a peck, but her mouth was definitely on his. Peter might still be asleep right now. She pulls back, looks at him inquisitively. “Was that alright?”

“Wha-alright-yeah, yeah, no, that was alright-that was more than, it was-you like me?”

“I thought it was obvious.”

Is Peter actually hallucinating right now? Is that happening? “Obvi-obvious? Yesterday you said you wanted to stab me with your fork! How is that in any way obvious?”

“I don’t know!” Michelle’s folded her arms, shoulders hunching in a little. Defensive posture. “I don’t really-do this a lot! I’ve never really liked someone like this before! I just figured that you’d know! I kissed you on the cheek!”

“Well, yeah, but-” Peter doesn’t know what to say. “You never mentioned it!”

“Neither did you!”

“That-that is true, yeah. That is undeniable fact.”

“Thank you!” She sighs, and her face still looks incredibly anxious. “I just-you used to be basically in love with Liz, and I’m essentially the complete opposite of her, so. You know. I didn’t really expect anything.”

“I was not in love with Liz.” He says, stepping closer to her. “I-you. I like you. A lot.”

“Huh.” She breathes, and something in her eyes softens. “Well-this isn’t going to be some shitty high-school teenage romance. I’m not going to expect you to buy me ridiculous gifts, and I’m not going to call you baby and tell you I love you every two seconds. That’s not what this is going to be. I don’t want everything to change. Obviously some things will change, but-”

“Like what?” Peter’s not even going to pretend that he isn’t blatantly looking at her mouth right now. What’s the point? They’ve made it this far. It won’t hurt anything.

“Like that.” She replies, quietly, once he’s looked up into her eyes again. She puts her hand on his neck and pulls him in, and they’re kissing, just like that. Neither of them have brushed their teeth, or their hair. Peter is wearing a giant fluorescent orange shirt. They’re supposed to be at school, and yet here they are, kissing in Michelle’s kitchen, up against the counter. It might not necessarily be a good kiss, but it’s definitely the best kiss Peter’s ever had.

They’re nervous and giggly around each other for the rest of the day. It’s the first time Peter’s ever seen Michelle this light and carefree, and it’s really freaking beautiful. She’s really freaking beautiful. He can’t believe that she likes him. He has to sneak out of her house over the fence in her backyard, which leads onto an alleyway, because he’s in his costume and as normal as it is to have Spiderman leave through your front door, it’s probably not the best move. She has to kiss him goodbye three different times because he’s so reluctant to leave her, but he knows he has to get home, that May will be waiting for him.

He swings home in a daze, and ends up lying on his bedroom floor, staring up at his ceiling in shock. Michelle likes him. She actually likes him. They’re dating now, maybe. He kissed her, a lot. She kissed him back. She initiated some of those kisses. How is this his life.

May finds him on the floor, mask off and the rest of his clothes still on. She takes one look at him and asks: “Are you on something?”

“What?” He flails upright. “No, oh my God, no.”

“You just look bizarrely happy. You usually look stressed.”

“I do not-” He pauses. “Actually, yeah, I probably do, but. I’m not stressed. And I’m not on something!”

“What is it then?” She moves past him and sits down on his bed, patting beside her for him to join her.

“Um, well. Me and Michelle are, uh. Together. I guess.”

“You guess?” She says incredulously, but she’s grinning. “That’s-that’s really great, Peter. You should have her over for dinner again! But this time there’ll be no sleeping together on the couch. Speaking of which, do we need to go over any talks again, or are you all set?”

“Jesus Christ.” Peter buries his face in his hands as she laughs. “That’s not even-come on-it’s not-”

“I’m just teasing, kiddo.” She puts an arm around him. “Come on, this is exciting! Your first proper girlfriend!” Peter can’t help but smile at that. “There we go. Man, you must really like her. I’ve never seen you smile like that before.”

“Yeah, she’s uh. She’s special.”

May jostles him. “That’s good. That’s really good. Doesn’t stop you from being completely responsible for dinner and doing the dishes tonight, but still good.” Peter opens his mouth to complain, and then shuts it again. He deserves that. “Now put some real clothes on. Just because you’re Spiderman does not mean you get to wear that around the house.”

***

School the next day is interesting. They have Chemistry first period, which turns into half a period of Ned complaining about the fact that they were both ‘sick’ the day before, and therefore abandoned him. “I had to sit with the rest of the decathlon kids, and they’re kinda weird. None of them have even seen Star Wars! I thought we were supposed to be a group of nerds!”

Peter scoffs, and Michelle presses her knee into his, and he pushes her shoulder against hers, and the rest of the day continues in these constant gestures. It takes Ned until lunchtime to realise something’s up, when Michelle lays a hand on Peter’s arm while telling him a story and doesn’t let go afterwards. He’s too shocked to actually say anything, which is probably the best case scenario, because the other one was that he starts yelling to the high heavens about it, and Peter really doesn’t want the attention of the entire school on them.

“Hey, so,” Michelle says, as they’re standing to go to different classes last period. Ned’s already disappeared in a haze of surprise. “My parents aren’t going to be home after school if you, you know, want to come over. Hang out.”

“Yeah!” Peter says, a little too suddenly and enthusiastically. “I mean, not, yeah, that’d be. Cool.”

"Cool."

"Excellent."

"Great."

"Fantastic."

"Amazing."

"Spectacular."

She laughs. “Okay, well, we should probably go. Meet you at the front doors after school?”

“Yeah, sure.”

He spends most of Spanish freaking out, which is pretty typical nowadays. His teacher still praises him like always, and it’s nice to know that at least one part of his brain is with the rest of his body, because he has no idea where the rest of it went. He also somehow manages to make intelligent conversation with Michelle the entire way back to her house, which is a shock in itself.

She offers him some water and throws some food at him when they get back to her house, which he takes, and they sit on her couch together. They’re eating, so the expectation to talk isn’t there as much, but once they’ve finished everything just seems to go quiet. They can’t even look at each other.

“Okay, this is weird.” Michelle says, bluntly. “How do we make it not weird?”

“We, um. I have no idea, sorry. We’re just going to be stuck here, being awkward, for the rest of time.”

“Damn.”

“It’s sucks, I know.” She offers him a rueful grin, and he kisses her, once. Just because he can. Which, as it turns out, is a pretty good way to make it not weird. One kiss turns into two, three, four, more than Peter can be bothered to count. It’s so easy. Kissing her is like breathing; hours could have gone by and he wouldn’t have noticed. Her hands are around his neck, and his are on her waist, and she’s on his lap, suddenly, one hand in his hair, and that’s as far as it goes, but. It’s good

“We can’t just make out every time we don’t know what to say to each other.” She sighs as he kisses her neck.

“I thought that’s what dating was?” He replies, and she rolls her eyes and laughs, knocks their foreheads together.

“You’re not even funny, I can’t believe I like you.”

“You know, you laughing at my jokes really doesn’t help your case in thinking that. Also, I haven’t done this before, but I feel like there shouldn’t be this much talking.”

“Yeah, well.” She kisses him on the cheek then the mouth in quick succession. “Put two mouthy assholes together, what do you think will happen?”

Peter’s about to respond in mock-upset, but two things happen that distract him: the sound of Michelle’s garage door opening, and Michelle herself rolling off his lap and straight onto the floor.

“Is that?”

“That’ll be my dad. Are you ready for this?”

He isn’t. In any way, shape, or form. But, he’s also planning on staying in Michelle’s life for as long as she allows, so. He figures he might as well get it over with now. He sticks a hand out for Michelle to pull her off the floor, and doesn’t let go of it once she’s on the couch.

“Yeah. I’m ready.”


End file.
